Commodore CASSIOPEI, User Manual

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9.4.1 Belt replacement
Worn out, loose, broken or sticky belts will make it impossible for the tape to be played at a correct
or constant speed. Worn out (or loose) belts inside the tape mechanism can create problems with
the continuity of the speed of the tape. You will most likely notice this during winding and
rewinding, the tape sometimes stops somewhere close to the end or the beginning of the tape. You
must fix this in order to continue. Belt problems can be detected (sometimes) by carefully listening
to the sound of the leader, the long BEEEEP tone at the beginning of each game/program on the
tape. Place the speaker switch of the Cassiopei in the playback position and playback your tape.
When the leader sounds like PEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP, your probably OK.
But when it sounds like BWWWWEEEEEEEWIIIIIWUUUUWEEEEWIIIWEEEWUUP (or
something similar) then your are in big trouble. Open up your datasette and inspect the belts. The
belts must be perfectly straight, if there is a bump in the belt, then this bump will affect the tape
speed. These bumps are caused by the belt being in the same position for many years when exposed
to the elements of attics and garages. The high temperatures in the summer and the high humidity
of winter simply isn't ideal for any material.
Attention: when performing this quick test, make sure that you have a tape from a reliable source,
do not use a tape you made yourself, use a commercial game tape as a reference. As these kind of
tapes are made with high-end recording equipment with very low wow and flutter. So there a
“PEEEEEEEEEEEEP” is recorded with a perfectly constant speed, which is just the way we need it
to be in order for it to act as a reference.
Tip: sometimes (many times they can't), loose belts can be revived (shrunk). Take a pan, add 200ml
of water, boil the water, switch of the heater, place the belt in the hot water. Leave it there for a
minute, then carefully take it out (best is to dump the contents of the pan into the sink).
Tip: the perfect way to solve your belt problems would by by replacing the old belt for a new one.
However, when ordering a new belt make sure that it is the right one as lot's of things can go
wrong. Do not be tempted to buy a bag of general purpose belts from ebay and hope to find a belt
that almost fits, although this looks OK at first, you may encounter problems with the tape speed
when the belt is too tight, you may encounter problems when the belt is too small then it may not fit
properly in the pulley of the motor, it might even get stuck or wobble. Also if the quality of the belt
is bad, the thickness may vary. This will immediately result is speed variations every time the thick
parts passes the motor, these problems are easily heard during the “PEEEEEEEEEEEP” test. And
cause the effect called “wow”. Describing the exact type of belt for the datasette, is beyond the
scope of this manual as there are many kinds of datasettes made by various manufacturers. Please
refer to the service manual of your datasette for the exact type. Or carefully measure the old belt
(thickness and diameter, see how to do this on the next page). Please be aware that an old belt
MIGHT (it doesn't has to) be a littlebit stretched, so please, on ordering a new belt, allow for a
correction of a few millimeters smaller belt. A belt is most certainly stretched when it starts to slip.
2019-10-27 Page 56 of 76 CASSIOPEI v2.0